Israel in war

There is a crisis going on in the Middle East, even as I write this. Many don't think about it because it isn't happening in their backyards and they don't think it affects them. I hope to shed some light on the crisis and also how it does affect us all.
Who is Israel at war with? Lebanon? Palestine? Syria? Iran? The answer is yes, all of them, although the ground war at the moment is in Southern Lebanon and the Gaza Strip(which is Palestinian). This recent outbreak started when an Israeli soldier was kidnapped on June 25th during an audacious Hamas(Palestinian) attack on an army outpost next to the Gaza Strip. Israel immediately warned that a major military operation would be launched if the kidnapped soldier was not immediately released. Ofcourse he wasn't and an invasion of the Gaza Strip began. Today, the army crossed again into central Gaza in search of a captured soldier being held in the area. The operation involved at least 30 armored vehicles, mostly tanks. Five IDF soldiers were wounded in the initial phase of today's operation. Several Palestinian rockets were fired into Israeli territory once again from the Gaza Strip.

On July 10, Khaled Mashal, the hard-line Hamas leader in Damascus, believed to have ordered the cross-border attack, vowed that Shalit(captured Israeli soldier) won't be released unless 1,000 Palestinians are freed by Israel. Two days later, Lebanese Hizbullah militants crossed the Israeli border and captured two Israeli soldiers. Hizbullah is part of the Lebanese government and the government has either been unwilling or unable to disarm the Shiite militia; Israel holds Beirut accountable for the cross-border attack and capture of the soldiers.

Israel retaliated after Hizbullah fired rockets into the Israeli port city of Haifa. Israel warned of massive retaliation following the attack on Haifa and charged Iran and Syria in helping Hizbullah with weaponry. It has been six days now and Israel and Hizbullah forces are now engaged in ground combat. Around 1,000 Hizbullah rockets have struck Israeli territory in the last week—the largest barrage upon Israeli population centers since the 1967 Six Day war. At a special security cabinet meeting in Jerusalem this morning, senior government ministers decided to continue on with the military campaign until two captured Israeli soldiers are released and the Iranian and Syrian backed Shiite group stops firing rockets into Israel. This was the official statement issued after the cabinet session: "The intensive fighting against Hizbullah will continue, including attacks on Hizbullah infrastructure and command posts, its operational abilities, its armaments, and the leadership of the organization." Army officials say they estimate they will need at least another 10 to 14 days to effectively destroy Hizbullah’s fighting capability.

That's the quick version of what has happened in the last month to spark this conflict. I'll be posting more on this subject tomorrow and will bring the bible into the discussion to show how this will affect us all.